About me

This blogname was derived from the novel The Secret Life Of Saeed The Pessoptimist by the Palestinian Israeli Emile Habiby: absurdism as weapon against the (ir)realities of daily life in Palestine/Israel. (The subtitle is from a book by Dutch author Renate Rubinstein. It could as well be my motto).
My real name is Martin (Maarten Jan) Hijmans. I've been covering the ME since 1977 and have been a correspondent in Cairo. I started my 'Abu Pessoptimist' blog in January 2009 out of anger during the onslaught in Gaza. The other one, The Pessoptmist, is meant to be a sister version in English. (En voor de Nederlandstaligen: ik wilde in november 2009 een tweede blog in het Engels beginnen en ontdekte te laat dat als je één account hebt, een profiel dan meteen ook voor allebei de blogs geldt. Vandaar dat het nu ineens in het Engels is... So sorry.)

Tuesday, April 26, 2016

Saudi Arabia plans to become less dependent on oil

Saudi Arabia's cabinet has agreed on a broad-based economic reform
plan, known as Vision 2030, revealing how the oil-reliant state plans to
diversify its economy over the next 14 years.
Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the deputy crown prince, said on Monday
that the country was building up its public investment fund to become a
major player in global markets.
He said Saudi Arabia was restructuring its housing ministry to
increase the supply of affordable housing, and creating a "green card"
system within five years to give expatriates long-term residence.
Salman al-Ansari, founder and president of the Washington DC-based
Saudi American Public Relations Affairs Committee (SAPRAC), told Al
Jazeera the green card system gives more rights to expatriates to invest
in the country.
Saudi Arabia will also sell shares in state oil giant Aramco and set
up the world's largest wealth fund in line with the plan, Mohamed bin
Salman said separately in an interview with the Saudi-owned Al Arabiya
news channel."We plan to sell less than 5 percent of Aramco. Aramco's size is very
big. It is estimated at between $2 trillion and $2.5 trillion," he
said.
"We plan to set up a $2 trillion sovereign wealth fund ... part of
its assets will come from the sale of a small part of Aramco."
Saudi Arabia's economy has suffered over the past 12 months in line
with the falling price of oil, with a $98bn budget deficit last year and
an estimated deficit of $87bn this year. Its reserves decreased from
$746bn in 2014 to $616bn today.